


That Would Be Enough

by rightmanham



Category: Turn (TV 2014)
Genre: Canon Era, M/M, Tallster, ben is ace in this so nothing happens at the end, caleb is not okay and i need it be confronted before the series ends, i did medical research and palsy back then is actually like parkinson's disease now, i've been rushing to write this before the next ep, probably takes place between 4x06 and 4x07, they used to call parkinson's "the shaking palsy" so idk, this is just an ideal situation where ben gets his head out of his ass and worries about caleb
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-20
Updated: 2017-07-20
Packaged: 2018-12-04 02:20:18
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,760
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11545428
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rightmanham/pseuds/rightmanham
Summary: "It runs in the family, Benny. I guess I'm just going to be useless a little earlier than planned, thanks to Simcoe."In which Caleb and Ben have an overdue conversation.





	That Would Be Enough

**Author's Note:**

> I was listening to the song "Johnny Has Gone For A Soldier", which got me into an angsty tallster mood.  
> Listen to it here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jd-eMYBw_hg&index=8&list=PL0VO7f_-OcAbKCylQ0HGQx1yCeKSzT6Qg

     "We need to talk."

Caleb paused in stroking the meager campfire, a few young soldiers around him protesting. He ignored them in favor of looking up at Ben's anxious face, barely masked behind the emotionless facade he had to put on as an officer. His hand rested on the hilt of his sword and his foot tapped in rapidly.

He stood up to clap Ben on the shoulder. "Of course, Tallboy." The antagonistic 'oo's from the soldiers fading away as he pushed past the entrance flaps to step into the dimly candlelit space. Opening his mouth to ask what was going on, Caleb was quickly shot down as Ben rounded on him almost angrily.

     "What's going on with you, Caleb? You've been acting offish lately and I'm worried." He confronted bluntly, his hands fidgeting nervously. 

Personally, Caleb thought he had been doing a fairly good job of acting normal. He didn't want anyone fussing over him, as he knew at least Ben would, and he didn't want to appear weak. He'd clenched his hands and stuffed them into his pockets when the tremors first began, pushed his muscles far past the point of exhaustion, straightened his posture when he involuntarily hunched himself while walking. On the days when it was all he could do to rise from a chair and shuffle the length of his tent, he had avoided people, especially Ben; he hadn't thought it was worth troubling anyone. Now, with Ben growing increasingly suspicious, Caleb decided the best course of action was to appear aloof. He barked a laugh and smoothed the officer's hair as it was ruffled feathers, grinning widely at his disgruntled concern. He hoped a couple smiles and a hug would convince him that nothing was amiss. He slid his hands down the length of Ben's arms to lace their fingers together before quickly recoiling when he felt the quiver of his fingers against his palm. 

Ben's eyebrows quirked questioningly and Caleb shrugged, willing his body to be still. "I'm fine." He insisted. "Really. I think I'm just tired, yeah?"

The steady blue eyes seemed to pierce through Caleb's lie and he knew his conscious was squirming uncomfortably. Ben dropped his gaze, sighing and seating himself on the edge of his bed. He pressed his palms into his eyes and sighed again, the second one drawn out and shaking with unshed tears. His legs bounced in quick succession, a fast tempo that Caleb could swore his heart pounded in unison to.  

      "As selfish as I know it is, I  _need_ you to be okay." Ben mumbled around his hands. "You and Anna are the only people in camp I can really talk to. I've known you both my whole life. Now that the camp followers are gossiping, I can barely speak with Anna." He paused breathing deeply. 

Finding that he wasn't sure how to reply, Caleb was silent. He and Ben had always been close, as far back as either could remember. He'd carried Ben back to town after he fell out of a tree and broken his arm, and likewise Ben had refused to leave Caleb's side in the first week or two following his mother's death. With a pink blush, he could even admit they were more than friends, especially in the past year or two: lingering hugs, clasped hands underneath the table during a meeting with Washington, even a few hasty kisses in the safety and secrecy of Ben's tent after nightfall.

Even so, it was difficult for Caleb to fathom someone caring so intensely about his well-being. He knew he was nothing extraordinary. He was born and raised on a farm in a small town; he came from a family that was neither wealthy nor particularly attractive. He never considered himself more intelligent than the average person, and he certainly wasn't the brains of the spy ring. He supposed he was proficient with a musket or tomahawk- or at least he used to be. He could barely hold either lately- but so were plenty of other men. He had accepted his place in other people's lives as a comedic relief at best.

Looking down at Ben's frame, hunched over with hands pressed so hard against his face they were white, Caleb half regretted not telling him sooner. He was clever and would have eventually figured it out, but it would have saved him some unnecessary stress. He sat down heavily beside Ben, both the bed and his muscles breaking in protest. Ben looked at him with wide, desperate eyes, his cheeks stained with the tears he'd tried to suppress behind his hands. He continued, his voice hoarse with emotion in a way that seemed almost alien.

     "I want to help you but I don't know how. Every time I bring up the subject you insist that you're fine." He exhaled sorrowfully, a sound filled with a kind of self loathing that Caleb was all too familiar with. "Caleb, I'm not-I'm not stupid. I know you're far from alright. You nearly killed Champe the other day when he was trying to escape; you're normally too good of a shot for something like that."

Caleb figured it would just be better to tell Ben what was going on. It wasn't worth the trouble to pretend like everything was good when Ben had pieced together that things weren't. He pulled their bodies together, the other soldier burying his head into Caleb's shoulder. Caleb rubbed small circles into Ben's back, and pressed a tender kiss into his disheveled hair. Ben laughed bitterly, pulling away. 

     "I'm sorry. You're the one not doing well and yet you're comforting  _me_." He chuckled again as hot tears rolled down his cheeks unhampered. 

     "Tallboy, listen." Caleb sighed, expecting those deep blue eyes to look up tearfully. When a specific lack of that happened, he placed a hand on his hunched shoulder insistently. " _Ben_. Listen. I'm no doctor and I don't know exactly what's going on with me, but I have an idea. You remember my dad from Setaucket? And my uncle?"

Ben nodded, his eyebrows knit with worry as he straightened and turned to face him. Caleb removed his hand from Ben's shoulder, hovering it above his knee as the involuntary trembling laced through his fingers and spread up his arm. At Ben's eyes widening, he clenched his hand up again and tucked it into his pocket shamefully.

     "Caleb..." Ben tried to offer comforting words only to be shrugged off with a sheepish grin. 

     "It runs in the family, Benny. I guess I'm just going to be useless a little earlier, thanks to Simcoe."

     "You're not useless, you're not-" Ben repeated, only half to Caleb.

     "I might as well be!" Caleb protest angrily, finally admitting to the weakness he'd always feared. "I can't throw a tomahawk or shoot a musket with any kind of accuracy. I can't even be a damned courier if I can't stay upright on a horse." He faltered, allowing his voice to die. 

When confronted with a problem in the past, Caleb had always reacted with energy, even anger in some cases. He had always figured something out, gotten himself out of a seemingly impossible scrap. He was determined and wouldn't go down easy. Among his earliest memories was bouncing on his mother's hip as she joked that he had been born during a lightning storm, trees aflame with the same fire that seemed to burn deep inside him. Now, in the dim candlelight of the tent, nightfall suffocating the air of the camp, his entire frame quivering, it was different. He'd been fighting in a war for six years, had seen men crushed beneath their horses, shot dead, freeze to death in the rags of their uniforms. He'd been injured more times than he could count on both hands, Ben even more so. He was tired. Any hope had dripped off his chest with his own blood as Simcoe carved into him with a bayonet. He was  _exhausted_. Resignation to an inevitable physical decline seemed almost easy. 

     " _No_." Ben's voice cut through the silence, flecked with steel and hardened in determination. "I refuse to allow you to believe this. You're the expert of unseen movement in the camp and you know how to survive in just about any environment. You can sail and trade and you're one of our only translators with our Native allies. Caleb Brewster, you are and always will be far from useless."

Caleb could feel a deep blush bloom over his cheeks and ears at Ben's unwavering insistence of his worth. His breath caught in his throat and he heaved himself off the bed. Reverting back to his aloof tactic, he stretched and yawned, changing the subject. "It's, uh, getting late. I should probably head back to my tent. Good talk, Benjamin."

Ben caught his wrist and gently tugged him back down, grateful that Caleb was allowing himself to be guided. Ben feared that one handle too rough and he would snap into pieces. "Can you spend the night here? I confess I'm still worried about you. And it is getting awfully chilly, it would be nice to have another body beside me."

Kissing the faint outlines of tear tracks along the length of Ben's cheeks, he nodded and stripped himself down to his trousers, Ben doing the same. After leaning over to blow out the dwindling candle, Ben buried himself under the thin blanket and against the crook of Caleb's body. After years in the army, Ben was lean and muscled. Even in the relaxed state of 'almost sleep', the tendons beneath his skin rippled as he fidgeted and breathed. Caleb's strength, to Ben's delight, was concealed beneath a soft belly and thighs. He radiated heat and was a most comfortable sleeping companion where Ben assumed he himself was not. 

Ben smiled sleepily as Caleb's breathing slowed and deepened into that of sleep. His scruffy beard scratched the back of Ben's neck and his breath was warm on his shoulders. Inhaling his surprisingly pleasant scent of salty sea air and leather, Ben nuzzled deeper into the arm wrapped around his waist. He peaked an eye open and could faintly imagine the large red gashes that laced Caleb's chest, only just beginning to scar over. His smile faded more when he noticed the increasing trembling that reverberated through both their bodies. Jamming his eyes shut, he thrust away any negative thoughts and felt himself drifting off to sleep with a repeating thought.

_Whatever happened next, they would figure it out together._

 


End file.
